Long Road to the Super Bowl: These Saints fans were there from the start

Tuesday

Jan 26, 2010 at 7:54 AM

NEW ORLEANS -- As a new generation of fans unleashed a boisterous celebration after the Saints overtime victory Sunday night, many of the first fans celebrated more quietly.

Doug MoutonWWL-TV

NEW ORLEANS -- As a new generation of fans unleashed a boisterous celebration after the Saints overtime victory Sunday night, many of the first fans celebrated more quietly.

"The tears came to my eyes because it was so long and drawn out," said Jake Romano, the longtime president of the Saints Booster Club. "We dreamed of this for so long, and then we said, the day may never come, but here it is and the Saints are headed to the Super Bowl."

Pharmacist Bob Cousins in an original season ticket holder who never leaves a game before its over. "I've seen almost every play the Saints have ever run and last night made it all worth it," Cousins said.

Cousins watched the Saints win in the Superdome with his family, sitting next to his son.

"And he says, remember when you used to carry me to the Saints game on your shoulders?" Cousins said. "And he said, wasn't it all worth it? Isn't this great? It was just a good moment for a father and son to have been able to share something like this."

Like thousands of original season ticket holders, Cousins and Romano cheered for bad teams for decades. "The only hope was," Cousins said, "there were going to win a couple games here and there".

"You knew going to the games on Sunday," Romano added, "you were probably not going to win."

Those are not the expectations of the new generation of Saints fans, who grew up with the Jim Mora coached teams in the late 80s and early 90s. Those teams performed significantly better than early Saints teams.

"You go back to '67," Romano said, "you had an astronaut as a general manager. How many teams had an astronaut as a general manager of a football team?"

Even through those lean years, Romano and the Saints Booster Club took three trips a year, to watch the Saints play road games, even though wins were rare.

That has now changed, and both Romano and Cousins said, immediately after Garrett Hartley's winning kick split the uprights, they began thinking of fellow old school Saints fans who are no longer with us.

Fans who didn't get a chance to see this era of Saints football. "Now, we're to an era where we look like we're going to be a contender to go to the Super Bowl in the next several years," Romano said.

And both Romano and Cousins believe the Saints have all the pieces in place to continue to compete at a very high level for at least the next few years.